“Why does having a church make you so happy? You’re willing to move across states just to have a good church. Why do you value it so much?”
Why do you not?
Jesus died for the church! Paul desired greatly to be back with churches and wasn’t always able to be with them and it pained him, longing to be back with them (1 Thessalonians 2:17).
Right now in our culture, church attendance is down. With so many options to watch church services online, so many believers have good intentions to watch, but never actually get around to it.
Even watching sermons or livestreams online is still not the same as being elbow-to-elbow, face to face with your fellow brothers and sisters. Serving alongside of them (Galatians 5:13), growing with them, edifying them (Hebrews 3:13), being fed spiritually, being accountable to one another (Galatians 6:1), carrying each other’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), teaching each other (Romans 15:14), working for the kingdom of God (Ephesians 2:10), etc.
While I highly support watching livestreams (I personally faithfully watch at least two each week), it’s STILL vitally important to the life of a believer to be involved in church.
A good, God-honoring, knowledgeable Pastor is rare and we should seek to be taught by such a man and to support his ministry.
We were created to be a community. In fact, when the Israelites were NOT acting like a community, God led them in the wilderness to start working together as a community. Their first testing/trial was at Marah. The well water was bitter, not drinkable. Shortly after was another test having to do with water. They were constantly trained to become a community and to think and care about others.
It is God’s desire that we be a community as well. We are not born to be hermits or zealots, locking ourselves in caves. The Bible says iron sharpens iron (Proverbs 27:17). How can you get sharp if there’s no other iron around???
We NEED each other. Even if you don’t need anyone else (which is highly unlikely), they need YOU! We all have something to contribute to the Lord’s family.
Another couple verses to consider are:
- Hebrews 10:25 – we are commanded to be involved regularly in getting together with other believers in some capacity
- Luke 22:19 – we are commanded to participate in the Lord’s supper as believers. How can you do this if you do not attend church? Do you regularly do this on your own?
“You mention how God was training the Israelites to be a community. Can you go into that more of how?”
Absolutely. Yes, I said, “We were created to be a community. In fact, when the Israelites were NOT acting like a community, God led them in the wilderness to start working together as a community. Their first testing/trial was at Marah. The well water was bitter, not drinkable. Shortly after was another test having to do with water. They were constantly trained to become a community and to think and care about others.”
It starts with God saving the Israelites out of Egypt with all the plagues. God parts the Red Sea, they have seen so many miraculous things at this point. They’ve SEEN, first hand, His POWER and strength and have no reason to doubt.
Yet when they get to the Promised Land right away, they send scouts and some of the scouts make the Israelites afraid to take over the land, stating that the people are giants (Numbers 13:32-33). Joshua and Caleb want to take the land God promised them, but the others didn’t and they were split. The Israelites as a whole decided NOT to obey God.
So, God led them into the wilderness for 40 years because of their sin to humble them and to test them (Deuteronomy 8:2). The sin was pretty major (rebels will be purged, exiled – Ezekiel 20:38), everyone died, even Moses. Moses got to see the Promised Land from a distance, but he never actually got to enter it. The only ones who didn’t die and got to go into the Promised Land after the 40 years of punishment were Joshua and Caleb, who originally wanted to go in and overtake it in the first place.
It’s during that 40 year stretch of history that God is teaching the Israelites to become a community and to grow them in their faith.
There were many trials that taught them how to be a community. The first was the trial of Marah. They came to the well and the water was not good. It was bitter. They say they named the place Marah, which means bitter, because of the water, but I also suspect it’s because the hearts of the people were bitter also. They complained and cried out to God in their sin, a lack of faith for God to provide. Exodus 15:22-24.
Moses ended up throwing the stick in the water and the water became fresh and they were able to drink (Exodus 15:25).
The second testing was also a well. There were around a million Israelites, so imagine coming upon a well and you have to give water to all the people, their animals, etc. Is there going to be enough water to go around? How do you decide who goes first? Who goes last? Do you send the aged first? Do you have women drink first? Children? How do you decide?
It was a testing of acting like a community, working together in order to meet the needs of the massive amount of people.
Another testing comes to mind is in Exodus 17:8-16, when the Israelites were complaining and God allowed some (the groups of people falling behind toward the rear) to get caught by the Amalekites. The Israelites started to war against the Amalekites to save their people (working as a community), but they couldn’t do it by themselves.
God had Moses raise the staff and when it was raised over his head, in that fight, the Isrelites were winning. But Moses (being an aged man at that point), his arms got tired and when he lowered them, the Israelites started LOSING the battle.
So, Aaron and Hur came along (working as a community) to hold UP Moses’ arms until the battle was won. So not only did they need Moses, but also others within the community, all working as a team, to win the battle.
After that, you almost wonder to yourself, if they moved up that weaker tribe to the middle of the group to protect them more, instead of letting them trail at the back. It’s about working as a team for the glory of God.
Even when they GOT TO the Promised Land, it was STILL all about community. Each piece of land is in long rows on the side of the hills (think: a very wide set of stairs). So, you have one row at the top and let’s say they don’t work their land or keep it up with rocks and keeping it stable, then when a heavy rain comes, it will wash their row AND the rows below them.
So you have landowners coming from rows of land below you who are helping you stabilize YOUR row because it affects THEM. One person not doing their job, can affect 5-10 other rows of land.
You also have where some rows had olives and others figs, pomegranates, grapes, etc. and they had to trade. Not every row, had EVERY type of food, so there was trading going on and a working together to accomplish food and stabilizing the land.
It was always about leading and growing them into a community, working together instead of being selfish and thinking only of themselves and their own family.